


Understanding

by kingdomkey



Series: WIP 1 [1]
Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Dark, Gen, Non-Graphic Violence, Torture, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-15
Updated: 2013-06-15
Packaged: 2017-12-15 00:58:54
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 382
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/843455
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kingdomkey/pseuds/kingdomkey
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is me working out an AU in which Roxas mirrors himself from the very beginning of Days, and is a young man hired by another to live in the castle as his personal torturer. Axel takes him under his wing. Expect more explicit violence from here on. No slash here, folks. WIP it good.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Understanding

Roxas and Axel walk down the hall late one night, the boy on the red-haired man’s left side. Roxas stares ahead, his face blank, while Axel watches him.

“Do you like your job, Roxas?” he asks.

In response, Roxas tilts his head. It is the only movement he makes besides taking steps and before he speaks. Axel notes the unchanging expression.

“I get paid,” Roxas says, straightening his neck. “Yes. I like the money.”

It’s not enough for Axel. “Forget about the money for a minute. Do you like what you do?”

Again Roxas tilts his head, processing the question again. After a moment of consideration, he comes up with an answer. “I like ice cream more than I like my job.”

“Roxas.”

Axel stops walking, and Roxas stops a moment after him. The blond-haired boy turns and looks up at the man with his empty eyes. There isn’t even a hint of worry or confusion anywhere on his face.  
“Yes?”

Clearing his throat, Axel wills his body to relax and his lips to move. “Do you understand what your job is? Do you understand what you do?”

Roxas stared, blinking only twice, before tilting his head again. A moment of silence passes between them before he speaks again.

“Today I tore the nails off of a man’s right hand. I stuck pins into another man’s head. I pulled a woman’s teeth out.”

“That—” Roxas surprises Axel with his nonchalance. Or is it his lack of empathy? “I don’t mean, do you know what you do. I mean, do you understand what you do?”

“I do what the master tells me,” Roxas says, sounding as if he’s reciting a pledge. “I always obey the master.”

The conversation is darker than Axel had anticipated, making him uncomfortable and wasting their time together. Roxas seems to wait for his next question or an order. The boy is his subordinate, after all.

“You should get to bed,” Axel finally manages to say, patting the boy’s shoulder. “You probably have a busy day tomorrow.”

“The master says I will cut out a man’s tongue and feed it to his cell neighbor in the morning.”

With one hand on Roxas’ back, Axel pushes him along to the boy’s rooms. He can think of nothing else to say.


End file.
